Brother says road rage victim outgoing, âvery friendly person'

MARTIN COUNTY — A brother of Steven Simon, who was critically injured during a Thursday road rage shooting incident on Interstate 95, said Saturday that Simon is recovering and only his spouse can see him.

“From the news that we get from his wife, he is recovering and there’s not much that I could say more,” Pierre Simon, 36, said.

Steven Simon, 22, was driving a Honda Pilot north on I-95 Thursday night in Martin County when a road rage incident happened involving Simon and another motorist, according to the Martin County Sheriff’s Office.

Pierre Simon said his brother is a pastor at Straight Way to Heaven church in West Palm Beach.

Pierre Simon described Lovelyn Salomon, the 25-year-old woman in the SUV with his brother, as a “saint” at the church.

“The church will still go on,” Pierre Simon said. “The church is a community. He might be the head leader of the church but apparently there are other leaders that serve with him that will carry on the work even if he is not there.”

The website associated with the church states it is, “The church that keeps it real, your center of transformation!” Steven Simon preaches “a non-negotiated gospel of truth, training warriors to take our generation and territory back through Kingdom concepts and precepts from the word.”

Sheriff William Snyder Saturday afternoon said Steven Simon, who was shot in the head, is out of surgery and in critical condition. He is expected to survive, but what, if any, long-term damage has not been determined.

Snyder on Friday said much of what investigators know about the incident is based on accounts from Salomon.

The incident began sometime around 10 p.m. on I-95 about 4 miles south of Bridge Road. There were a number of accidents and heavy traffic delays. He said at some point the two drivers “got into some kind of a jockeying position.”

One may have been trying to get ahead of the other; maybe one tried to merge and the other one didn’t want him in, he said. In the area of Bridge Road, he said, one or perhaps two shots were thought to have been fired.

Pierre Simon said he was at work when he got a call from his father asking whether he knew his brother was involved in an accident. Pierre Simon said he saw a news article about an incident on I-95.

“When they said his last name and his age and I knew that was my brother and that’s how I found out,” Pierre Simon said.

Pierre Simon said his brother loved church from a young age. At one point Steven Simon thought he wanted to be a police officer, but as time passed he turned toward the ministry.

“Ever since he was a small boy, Steven would not miss a Sunday church,” Pierre Simon said. “If I said ‘I’m going to church,’ Steven would be the first one dressed up to go to church.”

Pierre Simon said his brother was born and raised in West Palm Beach, saying he is of Haitian descent.

“He’s a very friendly person, he’s outgoing and he’s funny. He will joke with his friends,” Pierre Simon said.

“Steven’s a very nice person and to me, I don’t think my brother have any enemies.”

The shooter was described as an older man with white hair in a 1999 to 2000 beige/champagne-colored mid sized American made vehicle, similar in size to a Saturn.